[Webinar] 6 Best Practices for Managing Your Community

Building a community is often a long-term endeavor. Whether you want to create a professional community, an interest group, a member network, or an alumni network, you will need to take the time to facilitate exchanges and communicate regularly with your members.

How do you highlight the value of your community? What stratégie de communicationcommunication strategy should you prioritize? And what tools and best practices should you put in place to boost engagement

Telles sont les questions que nous avons choisi d’aborder lors de notre webinaire du 11 octobre 2022 intitulé and member participation? These are the questions we chose to explore in our October 11, 2022 webinar titled

• "6 Best Practices for Managing Your Community." Two speakers came to share their advice and experience:
• Kenza Bennani, Head of Customer Success at Talkspirit

Laure Baudouin

, Communications and External Relations Manager at French Tech Grande Provence

Here is a summary of their contributions.

What Is a Community?

Before diving in, let us start with a few defining elements. We use the term "community" to refer to a network made up of people who share the same values, whether or not they belong to the same organization, and who have common interests, projects, or professions.Communities offer many benefits to their members. They can help them expand their network, exchange best practices and professional knowledge, draw inspiration, share ideas, and

seek peer support

.Managing a Community: What Are the Challenges?Launching and growing a community requires addressing

• four key challenges:
• bringing together, uniting, and building connections among members,
• facilitating and energizing exchanges, encouraging
• information sharing and knowledge,Did you know? The

collective intelligence

the volume of internal emailsBut what actions are needed to meet these different challenges? Kenza Bennani, Head of Customer Success at Talkspirit, shares her best practices below.

Read also:

9 Best Practices for Engaging an Internal Community

What Are the Best Practices for Managing a Community?1. Define Your Vision and Objectives"Some of our clients sometimes skip this step because it seems so obvious to them," reveals Kenza Bennani. But do not be mistaken:

• defining your vision and objectives is absolutely essential! Before launching your community management project, you will need to reflect on the following questions:
• What type of community do you want to create?
• Who do you want to bring together in this community? What are their needs and communication habits? (For instance, do they mainly use mobile or desktop?)
• Why do you want to bring them together?
• What added value

will the community bring to members?

What contribution do you expect from them in return? 2. Set Up a Dedicated ToolOnce your vision is defined, it is time to

• set up a tool to manage your community. To do so, you will need to proceed step by step:

• Start by identifying your needs and constraints, by analyzing the profile of your "ideal" members. For example, are they comfortable with technology? Do they primarily work in an office, at home, in the field, and/or on the go? These questions will help you identify the key criteria for your search. Also think about how much time you can dedicate to setting up and configuring your tool.List the features
  • you absolutely need
  • on your future platform, for example:a news feed and a welcome portal to share information,a
  • chat and groups to facilitate exchanges between members,a library and/or drive to
  • capture members' knowledge

• , a directory to easily identify community members.Compare the toolsclassement des meilleures solutions d’animation de communauté available on the market, filtering by your criteria.

• Check out our ranking of the best community management solutionset impliquez les membres de la communauté to help you with this step.

the volume of internal emails — ideally with several beta testers —

and involve community members in the selection process. Involving members is a great way to ensure the platform meets their needs, and to identify future ambassadors! Read also: 10 Commandments for Setting Up a Community Management Tool🤓 Looking for a tool to manage your community? Why not try Talkspirit en toute simplicité, grâce à diverses fonctionnalités. 

? 100% made in France, our

digital workplace lets you communicate, collaborate, and content library with ease, thanks to a range of features. driveTalkspirit includes a news feed, a content library, content libraryin community life.content library, a drive, a directory, a calendar

,

webinars

, project management, and much more!la solution choisie vient-elle remplacer un logiciel Request a Demo ou s’agit-il d’un tout nouveau logiciel 3. Create a Communication Plan

Next step: communication. To build your strategy, the first question to ask is:

• is the chosen solution replacing an existing tool
• ,
• or is it a completely new tool
• with no current equivalent?

If the solution is replacing an existing tool, you will first need to anticipate potential resistance to change, by addressing questions such as:

• Why are we switching tools?
• What does the new tool offer that the old one did not?
• How will the rollout work?
• Will all the organization's data be migrated to the new tool?

Conversely, if you are introducing a brand new tool, the challenge will be to

• inform your community about it, and to communicate:
• the tool's purpose,Talkspirit brings real value to the community
• your expectations of members in terms of usage (should they log in daily? weekly? monthly?),
• and drive local tech activity.To make your communication a success, Kenza Bennani also recommends:

setting up your platform

and adding content before inviting your members,setting usage rulescommunicating through the channels you currently use (for example, email, instant messaging, etc.),

and

announcing the launch at an eventWant to go further? Download our internal communication plan template 👇sont les piliers de toute communauté. Comme leur rôle l’indique, les animateurs sont chargés d’animer les différentes communautés (ou groupes) créées sur votre plateforme, par exemple en y partageant du contenu pertinent, ou bien en proposant des événements qui peuvent intéresser les membres.

Si vous manquez de ressources, sachez que ces animateurs peuvent très bien être des membres volontaire4. Designate Community Managers

Community managers (or "animators") are the pillars of any community

the volume of internal emailsIf you are short on resources, know that

these community managers can perfectly well be volunteer members

who are platform ambassadors and want to help energize the community's exchanges. However, make sure to support them in handling this dual role — for example, by sharing best practices and publication examples in a private group (invisible to other members).Read also:

Managing an External Community on Talkspirit5. Spotlight Your MembersAnother best practice for managing your community is to highlight your members. For example, ask your community managers to regularly showcase each person's initiatives in posts. It is a great way to lead by example and

get members more involved in community life. Do not hesitate to also

run polls

to gather members' opinions, and to

create opportunities for exchange by bringing together members with shared expertise or interests at dedicated events.Did you know? The

directory

• le in Talkspirit lets any user easily identify and contact community members — for example, by filtering by expertise, role, company, or location.Talkspirit brings real value to the community
• 6. Measure the Impact of Your ActionsFinally, do not forget to measure the impact of your actions, both qualitatively and quantitatively
• .In quantitative terms, we particularly recommend measuring:the

number of members

• ,
• the

frequency of use of the tool,and

member engagement

(via likes and comments on posts).For a more qualitative picture of community success, you can also track:the number of meetings organized,

and the number of projects created on the platform.

• And of course,
• you can survey your members
• to find out what they think of the tool and the activities on offer.

French Tech Grande Provence: A Real-world Success Story

Now that you know all the best practices for managing your community, here is a

real-world story from one of our key clients: French Tech Grande Provence

• . Based in Avignon, French Tech Grande Provence's mission is to:
• support startups, unite the ecosystem (investors, partners, etc.),
• and drive local tech activity.Why and how does French Tech Grande Provence use Talkspirit to carry out these missions? That is what Laure Baudouin, Communications and External Relations Manager, explained in her presentation.A Need to Unite and Communicate Better Remotely

Deployed in 2020 at French Tech Grande Provence, the Talkspirit platform was set up to:

the volume of internal emails among the operational team, often working remotely (particularly, to reduce internal emails),

bring together volunteers, members, and partners

of the association in a shared space for real-time exchange,

• and unite the ecosystem
• around shared information and actions.Needs that Talkspirit met — all while offering 100% French hosting.
• Read also: Uniting a Startup Ecosystem with Talkspirit: French Tech Grande Provence's StoryA Platform to Streamline Collaboration and Information SharingDay to day, French Tech Grande Provence uses Talkspirit to:share information and best practices Talkspirit brings real value to the community
• communicate with the board, members, and partners via chat, video conferencing, and project groups,
• co-edit documents

in real time on the

OfficeNow office suite

,

invite members to meetings and events via the shared calendar, synchronized with Google and Outlook calendars,run occasional polls on specific topics.

• Talkspirit welcome portal of French Tech Grande ProvenceLaure Baudouin particularly values the post scheduling feature, Talkspirit brings real value to the community
• Clearly Identified Benefits
• For the Communications Manager, the verdict is clear: Talkspirit brings real value to the community
• and the operational team responsible for managing it. Since implementing the tool, she has noticed that:

the volume of internal emails sent within the team

has dropped significantly

,

• information is better shared across the entire ecosystem,community members are more engaged
• ,connections have strengthened within the team.
• Read also: Eliminating Internal Emails with Talkspirit: IM du Biterrois's Story

Best Practices to Follow
If you too want to boost engagement in your community, Laure Baudouin recommends:

regularly sharing information

with your members — best practices, events, calls for projects, but also lighter content like contests or fun posts —tagging members in each post to deliver the right information to the right person,

asking new members to introduce themselves

to help them build connections with the rest of the community.
*